MSc: Personal Software Process
Personal Software Process
- Course name: Personal Software Process
- Course number: F19-SE-PSP
- Area of instruction: Computer Science and Engineering
Course Characteristics
Key concepts of the class
A Practitioner’s Start-Up Kit course introduces the highest-leverage metrics, specifically the ones associated with improving time estimation and reducing defects. PSP is intended for practicing software engineers and their managers. The measures introduced can serve as the basis for software development process improvement in the organization as well as helping individuals.
What is the purpose of this course?
The main objectives of this course are the following:
- Student will reduce overall defect rates
- Student will spend more time at the front end of the development cycle
- Student will eliminate or nearly eliminate compile and test defects
- Student will be able to more accurately estimate the time it takes to build software
Course Objectives Based on Bloom’s Taxonomy
What should a student remember at the end of the course?
By the end of the course, the students should be able to ...
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What should a student be able to understand at the end of the course?
By the end of the course, the students should be able to ...
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What should a student be able to apply at the end of the course?
By the end of the course, the students should be able to ...
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Course evaluation
| Proposed points | ||
|---|---|---|
| Assignments | 50 | 50 |
| Reports | 40 | 40 |
| Attendance | 10 | 10 |
Guidelines
Instructor reviews your homework assignments for the following elements:
- Check if the data presented is within "reasonable" bounds for the current assignment. Reasonable bounds is dependent upon each case depending upon the assignment and the tools being used by you to develop the assignment.
- Identify any spikes or unusual patterns in the data which may be an indication of incorrect application of the process, a simple typo or incorrectly stated assumptions.
- Collate data submitted by multiple students in order to come up with a common set of numbers reflecting the data of the entire class.
Assignments will be marked as either, PASS, PASS but, or Resubmit.
- PASS - Means everything is good and you can proceed. Scored as a 0 (zero).
- PASS but - Means you did pretty well, but there are some minor things to review and in the long run these might create problems. Scored as a 0.5 (zero point five).
- Resubmit - You made an error that will cause many issues later on so it must be corrected before your proceed. Scored as a 1 (one).
Objective of course is to complete all assignments with the minimum score possible. i.e. a total score of zero at the end means you got a perfect score.
A passing grade indicates that you have successfully demonstrated an understanding of the lecture material.
Grades range
| Proposed range | ||
|---|---|---|
| P. Pass | 80-100 | 85-100 |
| B. Fail | 0-80 | 75-84 |
Resources and reference material
- Humphrey, Watts S. PSP: A Self-Improvement Process for Software Engineers. Reading, MA: Addison Wesley, 2005. (Prefered)
- Humphrey, Watts S. Introduction to the Personal Software Process. Reading, MA: Addison Wesley, 1997.
- Humphrey, Watts S. Discipline for Software Engineering: The Complete PSP Book. Reading, MA: Addison Wesley, 1995. (Contains original exercises)
Course Sections
The main sections of the course and approximate hour distribution between them is as follows:
| Section | Section Title | Teaching Hours |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Introduction | 4 |
| 2 | Planing and Estimation | 6 |
| 3 | Quality management | 6 |
| 4 | Time management | 4 |
| 5 | Conclusion | 4 |
Section 1
Section title:
Introduction
Topics covered in this section:
- Introduction,
- The Dashboard Tool
- Collecting Data
What forms of evaluation were used to test students’ performance in this section?
|a|c| & Yes/No
Development of individual parts of software product code & 1
Homework and group projects & 0
Midterm evaluation & 0
Testing (written or computer based) & 0
Reports & 1
Essays & 0
Oral polls & 1
Discussions & 1
Typical tasks and exercises for ongoing performance evaluation within this section
- Reading (Hum 05): Chapter 1 & 2
- Skim data collection reading
Typical tasks and exercises for seminar classes (labs) within this section
- Install the Dashboard Tool
- Write Program using PSP0.0
Test questions for final assessment in this section
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Section 3
Section title:
Planing and Estimation
Topics covered in this section:
- The Planning Process
- Software Size Estimation Methods
- The PROBE Size Estimation Method
What forms of evaluation were used to test students’ performance in this section?
|a|c| & Yes/No
Development of individual parts of software product code & 1
Homework and group projects & 0
Midterm evaluation & 0
Testing (written or computer based) & 0
Reports & 1
Essays & 1
Oral polls & 0
Discussions & 1
Typical tasks and exercises for ongoing performance evaluation within this section
- ...
Typical tasks and exercises for seminar classes (labs) within this section
- ...
Test questions for final assessment in this section
- ...
Section 3
Section title:
Quality management
Topics covered in this section:
- Design & Code Reviews
- Software Quality Management
- Process Definition
- Resource & Schedule Estimation
What forms of evaluation were used to test students’ performance in this section?
|a|c| & Yes/No
Development of individual parts of software product code & 1
Homework and group projects & 0
Midterm evaluation & 0
Testing (written or computer based) & 0
Reports & 1
Essays & 1
Oral polls & 0
Discussions & 1
Typical tasks and exercises for ongoing performance evaluation within this section
- ...
Typical tasks and exercises for seminar classes (labs) within this section
- ...
Test questions for final assessment in this section
- ...
Section 3
Section title:
Time management
Topics covered in this section:
- Time Management
- Pomodoro - Concentration
What forms of evaluation were used to test students’ performance in this section?
|a|c| & Yes/No
Development of individual parts of software product code & 1
Homework and group projects & 0
Midterm evaluation & 0
Testing (written or computer based) & 0
Reports & 1
Essays & 1
Oral polls & 0
Discussions & 1
Typical tasks and exercises for ongoing performance evaluation within this section
- ...
Typical tasks and exercises for seminar classes (labs) within this section
- ...
Test questions for final assessment in this section
- ...
Section 5
Section title:
Conclusion
Topics covered in this section:
- The PSP Body of Knowledge (BoK)
- Beyond PSP & TSP
What forms of evaluation were used to test students’ performance in this section?
|a|c| & Yes/No
Development of individual parts of software product code & 1
Homework and group projects & 0
Midterm evaluation & 0
Testing (written or computer based) & 0
Reports & 1
Essays & 1
Oral polls & 0
Discussions & 1
Typical tasks and exercises for ongoing performance evaluation within this section
- ...
Typical tasks and exercises for seminar classes (labs) within this section
- ...
Test questions for final assessment in this section
- ...